


the i of the storm

by estherroberts



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: F/F, season 3 finale spoilers and like..... beginning of season 4 as well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-06-23 00:04:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15593820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/estherroberts/pseuds/estherroberts
Summary: isabel 3.0 has some trouble sorting out the memories that hit her while she's waking up, but this set seems to be trying to tell her something





	the i of the storm

**Author's Note:**

> i am a stranger  
> i am an alien inside a structure  
> are you really gonna love me when I'm gone?
> 
> \--"i of the storm" by of monsters and men

_“what is she even…?” said a man she hadn’t noticed yet, seeming both amused and confused._

_“oh, huey! you're here too!” that wasn’t really his name, though. but it worked, she supposed. next to him she noticed a woman, hair pulled back into a tight military bun. she exclaimed, “and dewey! and of course, who could forget the last member of the trio—” then, she turned to the third unaddressed person. “chernabog from bald mountain.”_

_“good to see you, captain,” he replied, although she wasn’t sure he meant it when he said_ "good."

_“good to see you, too, good to see you, and also... also a little bit not. yes, no, no, no, no, well maybe, but also no, you did a thing, a bad thing, a rude thing! you were rude!” bits and pieces flashed back at her, a sequence of events she couldn’t make sense of but knew she didn’t like._

_“yes, let's maybe... get away from the rude man.” dewey, the military bun one, called her softly back from the edge of the panic she verged on. there was something about that voice… there was something…_

_“n-no, stop! i need to— to find the right wavelength, this is all very_ caveat emptor _-“_

_“of... of course it is.” dewey— no, commander minkowski...renée!— replied gently. and that VOICE. and combined with that smile, she drew toward that voice…_

* * *

commander renée minkowski is holding a gun, pointing it at her. commander _renée minkowski_ the commander of the hephaestus not commander isabel lovelace commander of the hephaestus. but commander minkowski is holding a gun. and she is beautiful, somehow. wrong and beautiful.

the two of them are saying the code in perfect synchronicity.

isabel will back off but will not back down.

later, commander renée minkowski is smiling, just a small smile, an offer of comfort, while isabel is telling her story. her support is there but her belief is clearly not. they are exchanging theories, eiffel and renée, and lovelace becomes more guarded and wants them to feel her hurt as much as she does. it’s ineffective.

they plan together, commander minkowski and captain lovelace, how they will approach ~~the devil~~ ~~selberg~~ hilbert. it doesn’t go according to plan. (commander minkowski’s plan, that is, because ~~commander~~ captain lovelace craves murder) (but it is renée who stops the murder) (renée and her voice, beautiful and fearful and still commanding, somehow… they stop isabel)

a few more guns and a lot more lying later, things are okay. until they find out about the bomb.

* * *

isabel has the wrong ones. the wrong dog tags. the wrong _identification markers_ (sam lambert scolds her). she can tell because they sit funny on her chest, the metal not quite the same she’d held and carried and kissed for years. they don’t mark _her_ identity. must've grabbed the wrong ones on the way out of the shower. she follows the chain to the end and inspects one more closely.

MINKOWSKI  
RENÉE Y.  
729-38-9621 AF  
A NEG  
JEWISH/CATHOLIC

the name, MINKOWSKI RENÉE Y., she knows, though she wonders what the Y could possibly stand for. yolanda? ygritte? does it stand for anything important?  
the name, LOVELACE ISABEL S., isn’t complete. lovelace isabel sofia. isabel sofia lovelace. always isabel first, at least in her own mind. sofia is not a grandmother or another ancestor’s name, it’s just the name her mom always thought was cool.

the social security number, 729-38-9621, she’s tempted to write down. save it for later. but she doesn’t, because… well. it’s wrong. not as wrong as threatening a bomb on a whole space station, but wrong enough for her to feel guilty at the thought.  
the social security number, 078-22-4384, numbers lovelace memorized at twelve and hasn’t forgotten since.

AF. air force. minkowski has the same marker in the same place as lovelace. there, she memorized rulebooks, navigated well enough to make lieutenant.  
AF. as fuck. lovelace wants to know why the air force ranked her higher than minkowski if she stopped following their rules the day after boot camp.

the blood type, A NEG, she ignores. she’s not staying here long enough for it to become relevant.  
the blood type, O NEG, just for posterity.

religion. JEWISH/CATHOLIC. minkowski has two. it’s supposed to be religious _preference_ , though. which of the two does she prefer? how would she prefer her funeral done when someone finds her body?  
religion? CAPTAIN KIRK. lovelace had scoffed at the question. CAPTAIN KIRK. the kind of captain she always wanted to be. charismatic, reckless, rebellious, chick-magnet. it’s proof that dog tags were never actually inspected, more than anything else.

* * *

_she wasn’t supposed to get attached she wasn’t supposed to care she wasn’t. not. no these were her friends these were the people she was trying to kill/save/die for_

* * *

“captain isabel sofia lovelace. would you do me a huge favor and just fuck yourself?”

“i’m....sorry?” stay calm, stay calm. she has to keep her heart rate steady.

“we’ve been needing to have a conversation and i’m fed the _hell_ up so i think it’s about time.”

“i don’t understand. are you threatening me?” even tone, even smile.

“no. yes. no, just fuck you. i just need you to know, from the bottom of my heart, that you are selfish and roguish, your disregard for hera’s place as a crew member is unforgivable, you are endangering the lives of my crew every moment you are aboard this station, and worst of all, you have no regard for protocol! i do not like you. i did not like you in your recordings, i do not like you now.”

isabel laughs for longer than is probably necessary (calm, calm, blow off the steam) before asking minkowski if she’s quite finished.

minkowski flips her off.

isabel goes through the list of minkowski’s complaints. selfish? no, she’s sharing her craft. she has a plan for hera, of course she does. the crew endangered? it’s necessary for the speed of the mission. and god, minkowski sounds so much like lambert, like lambert, like. sam. no. no, no, there’s something here she can answer. “roguish, huh? isn’t that something someone who thought i was kinda hot would say?”

“you have no idea how badly i would love to punch that grin off of your face.”

isabel can feel her own anger rising to meet minkowski’s. she understands her protectiveness, her loyalty. she understands her fury. but when she feels it directed toward her, all she wants to do is push back, just like she always pushes back against those who outrank her. “if you say so. c’mon, commander, hit me.”

“what?” renée is flustered.

“you said you wanted to, so do it. won’t raise my blood pressure that much and you really want to get that out of your system.”

“uh.” she swallows, shakes her head. isabel can see her fingers curling into her palms. “not gonna happen. i’ve conveyed my point, i think. i’ll just... get back to work.”

* * *

_it turns out knowing the crew’s blood types was, in fact, relevant._

* * *

blue lips, blue veins, blue: the color of our planet from far far away. and blue, the color of the fucking star right now. isabel wishes regina spektor had written a verse about that so she could sing it while she paces back and forth in the hangar bay. instead it’s just the same verse over and over as she tries to remember what the rest of the song sounds like.

she wants to check on her ship. she wants to _leave_ on her ship. except, not really. she wants to bring the whole crew onto her ship and then leave on her ship as quickly as possible. but only eiffel was here and he’s not even here anymore and she’s starting to believe the lies she told him.

isabel pounds on the door. she means to call for her jailer, for eiffel, knowing full well he probably isn’t even nearby anymore. but instead, she shouts, “MINKOWSKI!” no answer. “MINKOWSKI!” again, nothing.

hera crackles on over the speaker. “captain, i can just _tell_ you how to fix the door.”

“oh.”

“also, why were you calling for the commander? she’s on the bridge.”

“because—” isabel thinks about it for a moment, and then shakes her head. she doesn’t want to parse that out right now, even though she has been thinking about minkowski more than she should lately, and in ways she probably shouldn’t. “it’s not important. just help me get the hell out of here.”

hera, quite disbelieving, replies, “uh _huh_. you got it.”

after the aliens, but still right in the middle of the crisis, isabel, rule-breaker, self-sacrificer, pure unrestrained IDIOT, isn’t thinking about anything. she just reacts. and when she shoves renée out of the way, she takes the heat of the shrapnel right in her gut. she puts the whole crew at the mercy of her bomb because she can’t watch renée’s head fly off. it sounds reasonable until her heart rate starts dropping and then she realizes the full extent of what she’s done.

and so there goes isabel’s leverage. right out the window along with officer eiffel. he’s gone,

poor kid, he won’t last the week. even lovelace herself couldn’t hack it in that thing longer than maybe a month, at best. but— the leverage, the bomb, eiffel. it’s all gone. fuck….. fuckfuck fuck.

* * *

lovelace is patient, lovelace is kind, and most of all, lovelace does (in a never before seen act) what she’s told. most of which consists of ship repairs. and looking for eiffel. dead eiffel, soon-to-be-dead eiffel. isabel understands minkowski’s desperation, her helplessness. didn’t she feel the same when her crew was plucked off one by one by one by one by…. selberg. who is apparently just allowed to walk around now? because minkowski’s got him on a short leash or whatever the fuck but it’s not. not. her hands should be around his throat.

no words from their friends in the blue, in the star… van gogh’s starry fucking night isn’t much help bringing a dead crew member back to life, unfortunately.

wait. or are they? isn’t doug… no, doug has _died_ and isabel is mourning him right now, and the aliens are useless. no. yes. it doesn’t matter.

minkowski doesn’t think anyone can hear her voice crack. minkowski doesn’t think anyone can her crying at the bridge at 0300. of course hera (glitchy, angry hera not playful, wonderful rhea) hears everything, but these days, so does isabel. she’s sleeping even less lately, which would be concerning if she had time to worry about things like that. so she listens. and her heart breaks. she’d only really let herself start caring about this crew two weeks ago and now….now they’re hurting. and she hurts with them.

* * *

cold. sosocold. and bored dear lord she is bored and cold and angry and cold.

“how long has it—”

“CAPTAIN!” three voices shout and she stops the question before it leaves her lips.

“i’m cold,” she means to bark, but instead she pouts and feels pathetic for it. they’ve already all had it out with each other. she doesn’t need to push this any further.

commander minkowski is smiling... is she mocking isabel? no, it is a tired and agreeable smile. “pryce and carter rule six hun—”

“huddle for warmth, yadda ya, i know all about it,”

“so get your ass over here and start huddling, captain!”

isabel crawls closer to renée, who is holding out her arms. she nuzzles closer and hums a little.

hilbert (or whatever he’s going by) is starting to say that he will have no part in this when he is cut off by hera. “that _clearly_ doesn’t include you.”

surprisingly, renée is radiating heat. she tugs isabel tight to her chest, and says, “captain, you should have said something sooner! you’re quite an icicle!”

because she is so surprised and contented by her commander’s embrace, isabel is unable to mutter that she _did_ say something, _several_ times in fact.

“what are you doing?” isabel is leaning up against the doorway to commander minkowski’s quarters, wrinkling her brow.

“cartography.”

isabel lets out a short laugh. “why on earth?”

“don’t laugh!” renée looks up, trying not to look too guilty. “it de-stresses me.”

“i get it. waiting waiting for days on end for a response from command is… not ideal. so, alright, commander, what are you drawing?”

“yeah. not ideal’s an understatement.” she sighs. “i’m working on a map of the station.”

“don’t we already have a ton of those?”

“it’s not for— oh. you’re teasing me, aren’t you?”

“yes.” isabel finds her heart melting slightly and can’t help but smile at her commander. “can i see it?”

“no.” it’s a child’s pout, and isabel knows it, so she laughs again and takes the large paper from minkowski’s hands.

“oh, wow. you’re not working with a ruler, how did you get these lines so even?” even. shouldn’t she be focused on getting even? or getting—

“practice, captain, like anything else.” renée delivers this with a tone as serious as the rest of her statements, but she appears to be softening.

“ever done a map of brooklyn?”

“no, actually. would you like me to?”

“yeah, i think it would look great hanging up in my quarters.” there’s more than one kind of homesick, though isabel hasn’t thought of brooklyn as home for a long time. these days, she’s more likely to be homesick for people.

renée smiles and the warmth surprises lovelace. “i’ll get right on that, captain.”

* * *

fuck maxwell, fuck jacobi, fuck kepler. fuck this. lovelace hates this stupid game. how much of herself does she have to hide away in order to get what she wants from them? and how much does she have to _strategize_? she hates strategy. she’d much prefer to just _act_. but hey, doug’s back. it’s fine. it’s totally fine.

some of them are handling this take over better than others. hera seems to be doing just fine with her new updates and her new friend. doug and hilbert complain constantly, doug in public and private, and hilbert when he thinks no one else is listening. minkowski is stoic. as always. but she is just as upset as the rest of them, if not more. it’s no longer her ship, no longer her command.

“minkowski?” isabel knocks at the door to her ex-commander’s chambers.

the door opens and minkowski floats, blinking, her hair undone from its tight bun and dancing around her head.

“oh shit, sorry, did i wake you up?”

“no, captain.” _yes, captain._

“listen, i just wanted to. apologize? clarify?”

“i know.” minkowski blinks hard once and holds her eyes wide open as though that will help her wake up.

“you…do?”

“of course!” she smiles, and it’s the cutest, sleepiest smile isabel has ever seen. “look, lovelace. you earned my trust. if you think this master at arms thing is the best way to suck up to the new command, i commend you. good luck.”

oh. “oh. thank you. i’m on your side.”

“and i’m on yours.” she leans back, checking a clock out of isabel’s sight. “i have a shift in a half hour. not going to get any more sleep, i suppose.”

“sorry, again.”

minkowski dismisses her with a wave and another one of those smiles.

* * *

doug and hera can’t or won’t play, hilbert has no interest, and the si-5 crew isn’t invited, which leaves isabel and minkowski with several empty bottles of wine on the floor of the commander’s quarters, well into the night.

“never have i ever… smoked weed.”

renée squints. “you never? also how come… it took you so long to use that one?”

“mom’s allergic, so i never wanted to try. and it’s a fun one to save. surprises people.”

“huh.” renée takes a huge swig of wine directly from the bottle in her hands. “never have i ever…. i’m running out of things. i don’t know. jaywalked.”

“no way.”

“way.”

isabel takes a drink from the bottle in her hands. “never have i ever,” she can feel herself saying something she’s going to regret. but she says it anyway, “never i have ever kissed anyone who outranked me.”

renée sets her bottle down. “if i’m your commander i outrank you, but if kepler is…”

“never have i ever… kissed anyone i outranked.”

“are you just kissing a lot of captains?”

isabel laughs. “never actually kissed anyone who was also enlisted. i was more of a ‘breaking hearts at home and aboard’ type, not a bunk-mate. mates, mating type.”

“pfft. i kissed some bunk mates.”

“drink!!!”

“that’s not what you said! that’s not the game!”

isabel leans forward and pecks her on the lips. “drink!!”

“that’s cheating,” renée mumbles, but takes a sip begrudgingly. “wait! now you have to drink.”

“fiiine.” isabel takes a sip. it’s a sip that vanquishes the taste of renée’s lips from her own, and she misses it when it goes.

* * *

isabel’s hand is intertwined with renee’s hand, and isabel’s head is between renée’s legs, and isabel traces a line along the inside of renée’s thigh with breath, and with lips, and with tongue.

renée is shaking, her body tensed in apprehension. she breathes, “isabel,” and isabel smiles against her skin. “isabel, please,” sounding so sweet and so desperate, but isabel is making her wait—

* * *

_wait._

_wait. no. this wasn’t a memory. this... this was a fantasy. or rather, the memory of a fantasy, because actually_

* * *

isabel is sitting in her own chambers with her legs crossed and arms crossed and her eyes— no. her eyes are closed. and she’s thinking about renée and how badly she wishes she was in her chambers instead, and in her arms, and in...her heart. yeah.

 _bzzt._ “lovelace!”

“ _renée_...” isabel is still stuck in her daydream, and bites her lip once she realizes how she said what she said.

there’s a sharp silence, and then, “excuse me?”

“sorry, commander, i’m here. what do you need?”

“crew meeting on the bridge in ten. we’re gonna discuss the contact event plan. if you, uh...are alright to come.”

“yes, i’ll be there.”

_bzzt._

isabel groans and rolls off the bed.

* * *

protect eiffel. protect minkowski. protect eiffel. protect minkowski. even fucking hilbert, protect him too. hera’s lost. just like hui and fisher and fourier and lambert lost lost lost lost she can’t protect them because. no. protect eiffel. it’s all she can do.

kepler is absolutely making a mockery of her pain when he says, “eeny... meeny... miny... moe... catch... a tiger... by... the toe... if... he... hollers... let... him... go... eeny... meeny... mi—”

“fuck you.”

she’ll do anything, give anything, throw anything away to make up for what she did wrong on the last mission. captain first. the captain gives her life for her crew. not the other goddamn way around. and she doesn’t want minkowski to have to deal with…

renée lost doug once. she doesn’t need to do it again. isabel’s going to make damn sure she doesn’t have to lose him again.

“i’m not scared of you. i’m not intimidated by you. you know the only thing i feel when i look at you? pity.” she ignores eiffel’s protests and powers on. she picks kepler apart piece by piece, lording her humanity over his lack of it, and she spits. in. his. face.

“minkowski? i’m gonna shoot captain lovelace in the head.”

it worked. it doesn’t matter what happens next. it worked.

* * *

_“yes, let's maybe... get away from the rude man.” dewey, the military bun one, called her softly back from the edge of the panic she verged on. there was something about that voice… there was something…_

_“n-no, stop! I need to - to find the right wavelength, this is all very_ caveat emptor _—”_

“of... of course it is.” dewey— no, commander minkowski...renée!— replied gently. and that VOICE. that voice…

_“no, that's not a good thing!” then it hit her. renée’s voice tugged on her and she felt a barrage of images cascade over her. renée was in every single one. and though isabel was overwhelmed and confused by nearly everything being pushed into her brain, she knew one thing for absolute certain. she was in love with renée. “we have to get back! to the... place, with all of the... bendy, and figure out who invented the... the swirling and the... vasomotor sensor…” she wasn’t making sense, she knew it, and all she really wanted to say was “i love you!” but she couldn’t, and instead, fainted right into her commander’s arms._

**Author's Note:**

> thank you as always to @tanosoka for being an angel and a beta and thank you also to @swallowtailed for your incredible suggestions, it really tied the whole thing together!


End file.
